


So, That Was Weird

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Strange Tides [1]
Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Crack, Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-22
Updated: 2017-01-22
Packaged: 2018-09-19 05:31:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,659
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9420770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: Sandra discovers a merman on the side of the road. Wackiness ensues. Featuring sled dogs, Marvel movies, andlove you, babe.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Brumeier](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brumeier/gifts).



> For More Joy Day, but really for Bru, who brings me joy every day.

“ - And I swear, tonight is going to be epic,” Nicole was saying, her voice tinny over the speaker on Sandra’s cell phone. “Rom coms. Chocolate ice cream. Vanilla ice cream. You can eat all the chocolate, because I’m -”  
  
“Allergic to chocolate.” Sandra squinted out the windshield. It was pouring, and her wipers were swishing like mad, but she could barely see. “Tonight will not be epic if I die before I get there.”  
  
“Right,” Nicole said ruefully. “I’ll let you go. Drive safe. Call if you need rescuing!” And the line went dead.  
  
Sandra let her cell phone fall onto the passenger seat and set her hands firmly at ten and two. She hated driving at night, and she hated driving in the rain, but she hadn’t been able to hang out with Nicole in a long time, and she desperately needed some girl time. Her wipers were working double time, but she could barely see through the deluge attacking her windshield. If she went any slower, she’d get stuck in the mud, but if she went too fast, she’d hydroplane -  
  
Lightning split the sky.  
  
Thunder cracked right overhead.  
  
Sandra flinched automatically, shoulders up around her ears, and saw -  
  
A man. Sprawled on the side of the road. Shirtless. He was going to freeze to death. Face down in the mud like that, he was going to drown.  
  
Sandra didn’t hesitate. She pulled onto the shoulder, yanked her hood up over her hair, and jumped out of the car.  
  
The rain was freezing.  
  
Sandra scurried over to the man, wincing at the way the mud sucked at her sneakers (stupid canvas sneakers were soaked through immediately; she hated wet socks).  
  
“Hey, sir, are you all right?”  
  
Sandra came up short.  
  
Because it wasn’t a man. It was a fish man. A merman? He was flopping weakly. He had broad shoulders, a narrow waist, and a freakin’ fish tail. He was nine feet long, and his scales gleamed deep blue, and - he was flopping and flailing, like a fish out of water.  
  
“Hey sir,” Sandra tried again. He flailed some more, and then he stopped moving. Sandra swore and knelt down. She went to roll him over and paused. He had gills, pulsing slits along his ribs and the sides of his throat. They looked like regular skin - the man was pale beneath a golden tan - but when they flared, they were deep, oxygenated red inside. Like actual fish gills. Like -  
  
“I hope you’re not poisonous,” Sandra muttered. The man had short dark hair, a smattering of blue-green scales on his upper arms, in the small of his back. “Okay, Sandra. You got this,” she told herself. “On three. One, two, three -”  
  
She grasped the man’s shoulders and heaved him onto his back. She wiped the mud off his face quickly, and she saw he was breathing, fast and shallow.  
  
He was - startlingly good-looking. Long lashes formed dark crescents on his cheeks. Strong chin. Square jaw. High cheekbones. He was - he was a freakin’ fish man.  
  
Sandra shook him. “Sir, can you hear me? Can you tell me your name?” What else did EMS ask an accident victim?  
  
The man didn’t respond. He had more scales scattered across his chest - he was curiously hairless - and along the cut of his hips where his skin turned into fish tail.  
  
Sandra checked his pulse. Also fast. And the man’s skin was cold. Too cold.  
  
What to do? Call 911? No. If she called an ambulance, he’d be carted away and dissected in some secret government lab. Call her ex or one of his other nurse friends? No, he was on shift at the hospital. Should she take him home?  
  
No. No way could she lift a nine-foot fish man into her car. He wouldn’t fit in her car, and he wouldn’t fit in her bath. She’d seen _Splash_. She had to put him in the bath with salt in some warm water, right?  
  
And then she remembered. She fished her phone out of her hoodie pocket, hunched over it to keep it dry, and called Nicole.  
  
“Hey, you almost here?” Nicole asked. “I don’t see any headlights on the street yet.”  
  
“No, I had to pull over. Kind of an emergency.”  
  
“What kind of emergency?”  
  
“I swear I’m not crazy,” Sandra said, “but hear me out.” And she explained.  
  


*

  
  
Sandra had pulled her car closer to the unconscious man to try to shield him from some of the rain, waited for twenty minutes before she saw headlights coming from the direction of Nicole’s house. Relief flooded her when the headlights resolved themselves into Nicole’s husband’s rickety blue construction minivan. Nicole pulled up close and hopped out. She was dressed in what looked like naval foul weather gear, and all Sandra could see of her was the glint of her glasses.  
  
Nicole came to stand beside her, stared at the unconscious fish man. “Any changes?”  
  
“No,” Sandra said.  
  
“I’ll go open the back doors. I folded down the seats and laid out some towels. I have some thermal blankets. And I brought the moving dolly. I figure if we get it under him, we can tow him back to the van.” Nicole sounded unfairly calm. But then she swore softly under her breath, in one of the random languages she’d picked up as a military brat. “You weren’t kidding. He’s an actual fish man.”  
  
“Merman,” Sandra offered.  
  
Nicole sucked in a deep breath. “He’s going to be a dead merman if we don’t act fast. Let’s do this.”  
  
Sandra knew there was some kind of joke to be made as the two of them heaved and strained and tugged and finally got the fish man’s torso onto the moving dolly. How many college grads does it take to move a merman? His tail flopped pathetically as they dragged the dolly through the mud to the van. Nicole had a long piece of particleboard lined with a towel that she propped up against the rear seats of the minivan, and with some more creative maneuvering, they managed to slide the fish man onto it, tilt it up, and then slide him onto the nest of towels and blankets in the back seat.  
  
“Dry him off as best as you can,” Nicole said. “I’m going to call my mom.” Her mother was a nurse as well.  
  
Sandra climbed into the van and started at the top, drying the man’s hair like she’d done for her son when he was a little boy. She dried his torso and arms, careful of his gills, and then did her best to dry his tail. He was still cold, still pale beneath her hands, and his breathing didn’t sound much improved. Once he was dry, she shifted him away from the damp towels and did her best to swaddle him in blankets.  
  
“No, Ma, I swear I’m not doing anything illegal.” Nicole climbed into the back of the van as well and popped open her first aid kit. She tucked a thermometer into the man’s armpit, then pressed two fingers to his throat. “He feels really cold, but apparently he’s running a fever. Hundred and one. Pulse is high, hundred and twenty. Yeah, lemme take his blood pressure. Help me, Sandra?”  
  
They managed to wrangle one arm into the pressure cuff, and Nicole took the man’s blood pressure, relayed the numbers to her mother. His blood pressure sounded awfully low.  
  
“No, none of his lymph nodes are swollen,” Nicole said, having poked carefully under his jaw, mindful of his gills. “Look, let me get him somewhere warm and dry, and we can keep trying to diagnose him. Thanks, Ma. Love you. Really, all above-board here.” She pocketed her cell phone and glanced at Sandra. “Can you get the dolly and stuff into your car?”  
  
Sandra nodded.  
  
“Jon’s business trip doesn’t get done till next Saturday,” Nicole said. “We can keep him at my place for a couple of days. Stick him in the guest room.”  
  
“How will we carry him into the house?”  
  
“We will cross that bridge when we get to it.”  
  
Nicole and Sandra scrambled out of the back of the van and closed it up. Together they wrestled the muddy dolly into Sandra’s trunk, and then Sandra got into her car and Nicole got into her van and they formed a two-vehicle caravan all along the muddy route back to Nicole’s house.  
  
The problem with Nicole’s house was that the garage had been turned into a shop, and two cars were already parked in the driveway, one belonging to Nicole’s husband, the other belonging to his brother who lived with them. He worked twelve-hour shifts at a factory and was probably asleep.  
  
Sandra and Nicole both parked on the street, and they stared at the muddy path across the garden to the back door.  
  
“How are we going to get him inside?” Sandra asked.  
  
Nicole’s smile was very worrying. “I have an idea.”  
  
Her idea was to hitch her two dogs - both half husky, half sneaky neighbor dog (different neighbor dogs) - to the dolly. Sandra and Nicole uncovered the fish man in preparation to lever him back onto the dolly - and stared.  
  
His tail was gone. His scales were gone. In their place were geometric tattoos that might have looked like scales but were just dark ink, indigo on his clammy skin. The man had legs now. He looked like a perfectly ordinary human. Who was buck naked.  
  
“He had a tail, right?” Nicole asked faintly.  
  
Sandra nodded. “He did. I saw it. You saw it.”  
  
“Maybe it’s like _Splash_ ,” Nicole said. “When he’s dry, the tail goes away.”  
  
There was a reason Sandra and Nicole were as good friends as they were. They thought the same way at the uncanniest moments.  
  
Nicole wrapped a towel around the man’s hips to preserve his modesty, and then she and Sandra wrangled him onto the dolly. Then Nicole went to fetch her dogs. It took both her and Sandra to hitch them to the dolly with creative use of a power drill, hooks and screws scavenged from Jon’s garage, their walking harnesses, and their leashes. While Nicole encouraged the dogs to pull by wagging a rubber bone full of peanut butter in front of them, Sandra made sure the man didn’t fall off the dolly.  
  
Once they got the man in the house and into the guest room - which was thankfully upstairs and far away from the roommate’s room in the basement - Nicole unhitched the dogs and gave them bones as rewards, and Nicole and Sandra set about swaddling the man in clean blankets. While Sandra piled copious homemade afghans onto him (Nicole liked to knit and crochet during their movie marathons), Nicole put the muddy towels and blankets from the van into the washing machine in the basement.  
  
Nicole and Sandra stared at the unconscious man - color was returning to his cheeks - and then looked at each other.  
  
“What now?” Sandra asked.  
  
“We could call my mom again,” Nicole offered. Then she shook her head. “No. I’m terrible at lying to her. What about your ex?”  
  
“Also no.”  
  
“But he doesn’t ask questions.”  
  
“He’s at work, and - what if this guy’s a wanted fugitive? Or a criminal?”  
  
“I could take a picture of him and send it to one of my friends at the local PD -”  
  
“No. The government might take him away and -”  
  
“Vivisect him in a lab. Right.” Nicole sighed. “Look, he seems to be doing better. Let’s run his vitals again and make sure, and as long as he’s improving, let him sleep through the night. If he’s better tomorrow, maybe he’ll wake up, and he can answer some questions.”  
  
“And if he gets worse?”  
  
“Then we call your ex.”  
  
“Okay.”  
  
Between Sandra having taken care of her own sick son on numerous occasions and Nicole having occasionally tended her nieces and nephews when they were sick, they could figure out if the man’s condition was beyond their skills. So they parted the nest of blankets with careful hands and checked his pulse - it seemed pretty steady, less fast and thready than before. Checked his breathing - he seemed to be breathing normally, not so shallow like before.  
  
They were attempting to wrangle the blood pressure cuff onto him when he opened his eyes.  
  
Nicole froze. Sandra froze.  
  
He stared.  
  
They stared.  
  
Nicole let out a little cry of surprise and fell back.  
  
Sandra leaned in. “Sir, we found you unconscious on the side of the road. What’s your name?”  
  
“Danny,” he said.  
  
Success. “Okay, Danny. Can you tell us your last name? Your phone number? The name of some emergency contact we can call for you?” Sandra hoped he had answers and that none of them were dangerous criminals or otherwise crazy people.  
  
Danny sat up slowly, pressed a hand to his head like it was hurting him. “I - I don’t know. Where am I?”  
  
“You’re at my house,” Nicole said. She was half hiding behind Sandra, clutching one of the blankets like it was a shield. “Do you know what day it is?”  
  
Danny’s eyelids fluttered. “Tuesday?”  
  
It was Friday. He’d lost several days, then. Did he have some kind of temporary amnesia? Sandra glanced at Nicole. Should they tell him so?  
  
“Are you hurt?” Nicole asked. “Do you need any medicine?”  
  
“My head hurts,” Danny said. “Feels like a hangover, though. No bumps or bruises, I don’t think.” His voice was deep, a little rough around the edges, maybe from being unconscious.  
  
“I’ll go get some aspirin.” Nicole skittered out of the room, and Sandra heard her rattling around in the kitchen. Unfortunately, she’d left the door open, and the dogs came barreling into the room, curious about the visitor - and bored now that they’d finished chewing on their bones.  
  
Roo, who was a polite lady, hung back and eyed Danny warily. Flashbang, who had no manners, thrust his nose under Danny’s hand, demanding affection. Danny smiled and let Flashbang sniff his hand before giving the dog a thorough scratch behind the ears.  
  
“Hey, boy. Look at you! Aren’t you a pretty dog.”  
  
Sandra relaxed a fraction. The dogs liked him, and he was nice to the dogs. That had to be a good sign, right? Roo sidled closer for a share of the affection, and Danny obliged her as well.  
  
Nicole returned with a bottle of aspirin and a glass of water. “Here. For your headache. Although -”  
  
“Although what?” Sandra asked.  
  
“Can mermen even have aspirin?” Nicole asked. “I mean, dogs can’t have chocolate.”  
  
“He’s not a dog,” Sandra hissed.  
  
“He’s right here,” Danny said mildly. “And what do you mean, mermen?”  
  
Nicole blinked rapidly. “Um. Well. When we found you on the side of the road, you had a fish tail. A big blue scaly one. And your tattoos were fish scales. By the time we got you back here, the tail and scales were gone. And your gills seem to have closed up.”  
  
Sandra realized. What if he didn’t remember because he’d been the victim of an experiment, kidnapped by Tuesday, turned into a merman by Friday?  
  
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Danny said, and his tone was calm. Too calm.  
  
“We thought it might be like _Splash_ ,” Nicole said, and oh no, she was babbling. Once she got started, she’d be almost impossible to stop. “You know, if you’re dry, you’re human, but if you get super wet, you’re a merman. You could take a bath, and then you’d see what I mean. Bathroom’s just this way. Or -”  
  
Danny stood up, and Nicole let out a squeak. “No, don’t stand up!”  
  
Danny sank back down, wary and amused.  
  
Nicole thrust the water and aspirin at Sandra. “I’ll go find some clothes. No one in this house is nearly that tall.” And she vanished, fretting, into another room.  
  
Sandra smiled at Danny and held out the aspirin and water. “Here. For your headache.”  
  
Danny popped the cap off the bottle with a confident flick of his thumb, shook two pills out, and swallowed them, chased them with water. “Thanks.” He nodded in the direction of the door. “She’s a nervous one.”  
  
“In her defense, you really did have a massive fish tail when I found you.” Sandra studied him.  
  
He seemed uncaring of the scrutiny and his nudity and the strangeness of the situation in general.  
  
“Look, we’re not going to tell anyone what you are,” Sandra said. “It’s why we didn’t call the EMTs or the cops. But if you’ve got memory loss, well, that’s beyond us, and you may need professional help. So you remember your name is Danny -”  
  
He frowned. “What?”  
  
“When you woke up, I asked you your name, and you said Danny.”  
  
He shook his head, looking pained again. “No, that’s not my name, my name is -” He sighed. “I can’t remember. Everyone has a name. But every time I go to say mine, it’s - gone.”  
  
“What do you remember?”  
  
“It’s all a blur. I remember shouting, and cold, and wet, and...a power drill?”  
  
That was from the impromptu dog sled the women had built to get him inside the house. Basically he didn’t remember anything.  
  
“Do you know where you are?” Sandra said. “I mean, besides Nicole’s house.”  
  
Not-Danny frowned. “I - Jersey? New Jersey.”  
  
“No, you’re in Gilboa. In New York.”  
  
“That doesn’t sound right. But nothing sounds right.”  
  
“Is Danny your friend or something?”  
  
“I don’t remember.”  
  
But the way Not-Danny’s expression softened for just a moment made Sandra wonder if this Danny person was more than a friend.  
  
“Well, don’t strain yourself. Get some food in you, and we can try to figure out what to do from there.”  
  
Not-Danny perked up. “Food?”  
  
“Nicole and I were planning on having a girl fest, so there’s a lot of ice cream and junk food to be had, but I’m sure she has something a little more wholesome in her kitchen.”  
  
Nicole returned with a pair of sweats. “They should fit around the waist, but they’re probably too short.”  
  
Not-Danny stood up, unabashed of his nudity - he was incredibly muscular, so he had nothing to be embarrassed about - and pulled them on with a nod of thanks. They ended halfway up his calves but generally did fit all right. Nicole handed him a t-shirt with a logo from some obscure metal band - she’d borrowed the clothes from her brother-in-law, then - and managed not to look completely discomfited by Not-Danny and his towering height now that he was upright.  
  
Sandra cleared her throat. “So, update. His name’s not Danny.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“And last he remembers, it’s Tuesday in Jersey.”  
  
“Ah. So - temporary name? Because we can’t just call him Not-Danny. How about John, like John Doe?”  
  
Not-Danny looked alarmed at the notion. “I - no. That doesn’t sound right.”  
  
“Well, there’s always Bob,” Nicole said.  
  
“Who’s Bob?” Not-Danny asked.  
  
“Could be you, till we figure out your real name.” Nicole offered a winning smile.  
  
“Also no,” Not-Danny said.  
  
“Michael? Kenny? Todd?” Sandra asked.  
  
Nicole shook her head. “Not pale enough for Todd.”  
  
“Do I get a say in this?” Not-Danny asked. He sounded more amused than annoyed.  
  
“We could just list off names till you hear one you like,” Nicole said.  
  
Not-Danny’s stomach rumbled.  
  
“But first, food.” Nicole turned and headed for the kitchen, and Flashbang and Roo followed, hoping for treats.  
  
Not-Danny took a seat at the kitchen table while Nicole fired up the oven and prepped a frozen pizza for cooking. She poured him another glass of water. Sandra sat beside him.  
  
“How about Tony?” Sandra offered.  
  
“Why Tony?” Not-Danny didn’t look immediately put off by the name. He moved smoothly, didn’t appear to be favoring any of his limbs. Basically uninjured, then.  
  
“Like Tony Stark,” Nicole said, and yes, she and Sandra had been friends for far too long. “Tall, dark, handsome.”  
  
Not-Danny blinked. “You think I’m handsome?”  
  
Nicole snorted. “Have you looked in a mirror lately?”  
  
“Well, no.”  
  
“Oh. Sandra, why don’t you give him the dime tour - show him the bathroom so he can have an educational look in the mirror - while I get this pizza going?”  
  
Sandra nodded. She knew Nicole’s house as well as her own. “Come along, Tony.”  
  
“No, not Tony. And should she be noticing I’m handsome? She’s wearing a wedding ring.”  
  
Not-Danny was observant, then.  
  
“She’d have to be blind not to notice,” Sandra said. “So, you remember the guest room. This is the master bedroom, the den, and the bathroom. Take a good look in the mirror.”  
  
“Well, I’m not ugly. Not all that handsome, though.”  
  
“Maybe tall, dark, and handsome just isn’t your type.” Sandra stood in the doorway and watched Not-Danny peer at himself.  
  
“It’s like looking at a stranger,” he said.  
  
“Well, Bucky -”  
  
“Why Bucky?”  
  
“Tony Stark is an Avenger. So’s Bucky Barnes.”  
  
Not-Danny considered it for a long moment. “No.”  
  
“His real name is James,” Sandra offered.  
  
“Also no.”  
  
Sandra shrugged. “Okay. Reflection not jogging your memory at all?”  
  
Not-Danny shook his head and sighed.  
  
“Maybe later. C’mon, Steve.”  
  
“Steve?”  
  
“Steve Rogers. Captain America. Bucky Barnes’s best friend.” Sandra narrowed her eyes at him. “Are you even American?”  
  
“Yes,” Not-Danny said. The response was automatic, sure. Even he looked surprised at his own vehemence.  
  
“That answers that.” Sandra led him back to the kitchen, where Nicole was setting the table.  
  
“I like Steve, though.” He trailed after her.  
  
Sandra sank down in one of the chairs. “We have a winner. I bring you Steve, no longer Not-Danny.”  
  
“Captain America. Very nice.” Nicole nodded her approval.  
  
The newly-christened Steve glanced at her, then back at Sandra. “Can you two read each other’s minds or something?”  
  
Sandra laughed. “We’ve been friends for a while.”  
  
“So, Steve, what’s the plan? You seem physically healthy, but the whole memory loss thing says that’s not so true. Do you want us to call the police? Or we could, I don’t know, make one of those Found posters, like for a dog -”  
  
“He’s not a dog,” Sandra said.  
  
“ - And post it on the Internet and hope your friends recognize you.”  
  
Steve considered. “Apart from a headache, I generally feel okay. And when Sandra said the name Steve, it worked for me. So - can you give me a day? To see if anything comes back.”  
  
Sandra glanced at Nicole. Nicole nodded.  
  
“Sure.” Then Nicole cleared her throat. “Look, about the merman thing -”  
  
Steve’s expression immediately closed off.  
  
“We’re not going to tell anyone, promise. I mean, who’d believe us anyway?”  
  
Steve shrugged once.  
  
“Just - I don’t think your tail will fit in my bath. If you wanted to take a bath. We could probably do a Walmart run, get you some clean clothes that actually fit. I know I have spare toothbrushes.”  
  
Sandra stepped in before Nicole could babble more. “In the meantime, what’s the plan? I mean, pizza, obviously. I know you have some fun board games, Nicole.”  
  
And then Steve smiled, and yeah, he was handsome. “You ladies said you had plans. Don’t let me disrupt them any more than I already have. I appreciate your rescue, I really do. I can hang out with the dogs and read, or something.”  
  
“We could watch a movie together,” Sandra offered.  
  
Nicole lit up. “We could watch some Marvel movies! So you understand where your name comes from. Not to stereotype, but you don’t seem like the kind of man who enjoys romantic comedies.”  
  
Steve furrowed his brow at the notion. “But you’re going out on a huge limb for me. You don’t even know me.”  
  
“It’s not like we don’t enjoy those movies,” Sandra said. “Action and explosions for you, fun for us. How about it?”  
  
“Pizza’s almost done,” Nicole said.  
  
“Sure,” Steve said. “Marvel movies it is.”  
  
Sandra agreed to dish up the pizza while Nicole headed into the den to set up the movie. Her brother-in-law was an electrical engineer and had done something very complicated to the ancient sound system, ancient DVD player, and brand new television and gaming consoles to give the system epic surround sound, and Sandra had never figured out how to get the television to play what she wanted.  
  
The dogs followed Steve - and his plate full of pizza - into the den and sat at his feet when he sat down on the loveseat. They gazed adoringly at his pizza while Sandra arranged a comfy spot for herself on the couch, complete with pillow and afghan.  
  
Nicole fired up the TV, where it landed on static. She pressed a button, and the static resolved itself into - the local news. Some kind of emergency broadcast, a press conference.  
  
There were uniformed officers, men in black suits, and a crowd of reporters. The man standing at the podium was neither a uniformed officer nor clad in a black suit, instead was wearing a button-down shirt and tie. He was short, compared to all the people around him, including the lovely dark-skinned woman and the Asian man with him. The black man behind him was a veritable mountain in comparison.  
  
“ - And we’re asking for anyone who has even the slightest hint of information to call the tipline on the bottom of the screen, because it is vital that we recover Commander McGarrett and bring his kidnappers to justice.”  
  
Nicole made a face. She hated watching the news, said her work was depressing enough as it was. Throwing in depressing news from the outside world was just unhelpful.  
  
“This pizza’s really good,” Steve said. “I don’t remember the last time I ate.”  
  
Sandra huffed. “Was that a joke?”  
  
Steve grinned at her. “Maybe.”  
  
Nicole was still fiddling with wires and connections. The process was finicky but the end product was worth it. She had a stack of every Avengers movie beside her.  
  
A female newscaster began to voice over. “And that was Detective Daniel Williams of the Hawaii Five-0 Task Force, pleading for the return of the Task Force’s leader, Steven McGarrett, after he was kidnapped by armed assailants during a shoot-out at a factory in downtown Trenton where the Five-0 Task Force was assisting local PD in a drug bust for a narcotics ring that spanned from New Jersey to Hawaii. If anyone has any information, please call the tip line.”  
  
A picture flashed on screen, of a man in a fancy naval officer’s uniform.  
  
Sandra dropped her slice of pizza. “Steve, that’s you!”  
  
Roo and Flashbang pounced on the pizza, and battle ensued.  
  
Nicole’s head came up sharply. “What?”  
  
“Call the tip line,” Sandra said, but Steve said,  
  
“Wait.”  
  
“Wait?” Nicole echoed. “You’re a law enforcement officer. Crazy people kidnapped you! They probably want to hurt you! Your friends can keep you safe.”  
  
Sandra glanced at the screen, where the news story was still running. “That was Danny, right?” Detective Daniel Williams, the newscaster had said.  
  
“They don’t know what I am,” Steve said. His name really _was_ Steve.  
  
Nicole turned toward him more fully. “Are you remembering now? Is it coming back?”  
  
“It’s all a jumbled mess. Bits and pieces. But I know they don’t know about -” He gestured at his legs.  
  
“You being a merman,” Nicole said.  
  
“We’re called Sea People.”  
  
“They’re your friends, though. They miss you. They’ll protect you,” Sandra said gently. “And if not, well, you saw your picture. You’re a soldier, right? Or a sailor? You can probably protect yourself.”  
  
“SEAL, actually,” Steve said.  
  
Nicole frowned. “Like a selkie?”  
  
“Not that kind of seal.” Steve chuckled. “Selkies are real, though.”  
  
“This got weird, and fast,” Sandra said. “I need more pizza.” She stood up and headed into the kitchen. Roo and Flashbang followed, hoping for more pizza.  
  
When she got back to the den, Nicole had the DVD all set up, and the menu was looping while she spoke quietly to Steve.  
  
“What’s the verdict?” Sandra sat down on the couch with a new slice of pizza.  
  
“Steve will stay the night, wait for more of his memory to return, and make an informed decision in the morning,” Nicole said.  
  
Sandra nodded. “All right. So, Captain America?”  
  
Steve nodded. “Captain America.”  
  
Nicole pressed play.  
  
They watched Captain America, Iron Man, Thor, the first Avengers movie, and Winter Soldier before they were too tired to go on. They ate all the pizza, most of the ice cream, and at least half of their stash of junk food. Through it all, Sandra studied Steve, glimpsed several moments when he was smiling, maybe remembering seeing these movies for the first time. There were several moments where he looked pensive, too. Like when Bucky died, and when Agent Coulson died.  
  
Finally, though, they had to give in to exhaustion. Steve attempted to be gentlemanly and offered to sleep on the couch, but he was too tall for it. Nicole ordered him to the guest room, gave Sandra the master bedroom - with the warning that the dogs would want to sleep with her - and promptly fell asleep on the loveseat.  
  
Steve stared at her. “Is she really -?”  
  
“She’s borderline narcoleptic. Can sleep whenever and wherever. Let me show you where the spare toothbrushes are.”  
  
Steve let Sandra use the bathroom first - she’d packed an overnight bag, as her boy would be staying with his dad for the weekend - and then sure enough, the dogs followed her into the master bedroom. Roo curled up on her favorite blanket on the floor, but Flashbang sprawled across half of the bed like it was his own.  
  
Sandra heard the bath running as she fell asleep.  
  
When she woke the next day, it was to the scent of sizzling bacon, eggs, and toast. She poked her head into the kitchen and saw Steve at the stove, Roo and Flashbang sitting at his heels and watching the bacon raptly.  
  
He flashed her a smile that probably broke hearts all across Hawaii. “Good morning. Breakfast should be ready soon.”  
  
“Excellent. I’ll wash up and bright there.”  
  
When Sandra finished her morning ablutions and headed to the kitchen, Nicole was sitting at the breakfast table, disturbingly perky and awake and asking Steve about his time in SEAL training.  
  
“How did you avoid the whole Sea People thing when you were doing training exercises in the water?”  
  
“The change is voluntary,” he said. “Unless I’m unconscious and in the water, and then it’s involuntary so I don’t drown.”  
  
“So is your entire family Sea People?”  
  
“It’s from my mom’s side of the family.”  
  
“Cool.” Nicole smiled. “Good morning, Sandra!”  
  
“Morning.” She sat down at the table, and Steve, who was wearing one of the pink frilly aprons Nicole had bought her husband as a joke, served up bacon, eggs, and hash browns. “Thank you. So, memory all coming back?”  
  
“There are still gaps. I don’t remember who took me, or where they took me, or how I escaped. But most of it’s back,” he said.  
  
“And have you decided, then? Are we calling in a tip?”  
  
Steve glanced at Nicole.  
  
“Your life,” she said, and shrugged. “As much fun as this crazy adventure has been, you can’t live on my couch eating pizza and ice cream and watching Marvel movies forever. You seem like the kind of guy who likes to be active.” She added, “And it seems like your friends really miss you.”  
  
“Are you ever going to tell them what you are?” Sandra asked. “I mean, we don’t really know you, but you seem like a nice guy, and we’re cool with it.”  
  
“Mostly I’m glad I’m not crazy,” Nicole said.  
  
“Oh, you _are_ crazy, but not about Steve here being Sea People.”  
  
Nicole laughed. “True.”  
  
Steve shrugged. “My mother always warned me not to tell anyone. She never even told my father. Granted, she also never told any of us she was a CIA agent, so there you go. And my sister didn’t get the gene.”  
  
“At the very least,” Sandra said, “we can tell them where you are.”  
  
Nicole slid her phone across the table and unlocked it, opened up her browser to where she had the tip hotline webpage open. “Whenever you’re ready.”  
  
Steve stared at it. “I joined the Navy so I could see the world, sail the Seven Seas. Look for more people like me. I never found them, though. I was always afraid it was because they didn’t exist. My mom eventually told me that they didn’t take to betrayal well, to abandoning the seas for dry land. I’ve always been stuck between two worlds. Right now I don’t feel stuck. I just feel like - me.”  
  
Sandra suspected he wasn’t nearly as verbose or open with his feelings when his memory was intact. She supposed there was some freedom for him, in being able to be open about who he was, especially with strangers.  
  
She said, “Eat your breakfast, first. You’ll need your strength for the day.”  
  
“Yes, mom,” Steve said dryly, but he did take off the apron and sit down at the third place setting, serve himself some food. “Whatever happened to Bucky?”  
  
That was a non-sequitur. “Bucky?” Sandra echoed.  
  
“He saved Steve. Did he ever remember Steve? Did he ever stop being the Winter Soldier?”  
  
“You’ve probably seen that movie, too,” Nicole said.  
  
“If I did, I don’t remember.”  
  
Sandra said, “Bucky did eventually remember Steve, and he stopped being the Winter Soldier.”  
  
“And that was it? Everything was better for them?”  
  
There was no way to encapsulate all the complications of Civil War into a brief explanation. So Sandra said, “They had each other, and that was enough.”  
  
Steve nodded, finished eating in silence. After he drained his glass of orange juice, he reached for Nicole’s phone and tapped the screen. Pressed the call button.  
  
It rang and rang, and then a woman said, “Trenton PD Tip Hotline, may I ask who is speaking?”  
  
Steve froze.  
  
Nicole took over, gave the woman her name.  
  
“And what information do you have relating to the whereabouts of Steven McGarrett?”  
  
“Pretty solid, specific information,” Nicole said, “but I’ll only give it to Detective Williams.”  
  
“Ma’am -”  
  
“Only Detective Williams.”  
  
Sandra raised her eyebrows. She’d never seen Nicole in professional mode, since their interactions were always casual and friendly and related to writing and fandom and life outside work, but she suspected Nicole’s professional mode sounded a lot like this, firm and unwavering without being rude.  
  
“Hold, please.”  
  
The hold music was lame, but Nicole did a little dance in her chair, and Steve cracked a grin.  
  
Sandra pushed aside her empty plate and leaned in, listening, waiting.  
  
The hold music cut off.  
  
“This is Detective Danny Williams. To whom am I speaking?”  
  
He called himself Danny. He was the first person Steve had asked for, when he’d awoken.  
  
Nicole nudged the phone closer to Steve.  
  
“Hello?” Danny sounded impatient.  
  
“Danny,” Steve said.  
  
“...Steve?”  
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“Where are you? Are you all right? Did you escape? How are you calling me? Why didn’t you call me sooner? Kono and Chin and Lou have been worried sick about you, not to mention Gracie and Mary and -”  
  
“Slow down,” Steve said. “I’m fine.”  
  
“Fine? You’ve been missing since Tuesday. It’s Saturday. Where are you? Do I need to run a trace on this number? Can we get a trace on this number? And scramble a chopper to -”  
  
“Danny, I promise, I’m fine. I’ll give you the address of where I’m staying. I’m unharmed and with friends.”  
  
“Friends? What, you just took a vacation to see friends? In - in Utah?”  
  
“It’s a Utah number,” Nicole broke in, “but I live in New York.”  
  
“Steve, please tell me that you did not leave me and the rest of Five-0 having heart attacks while you ran off for an interstate booty call.” Danny was a very high-strung person.  
  
Steve huffed, amused. “No, I did not. Look, Nicole and her friend have been taking care of me while I recover -”  
  
“Recover? Is this like North Korea again? Or that time in that warehouse with Wo Fat?”  
  
“Danny! Do you want the address or not?”  
  
“Already traced the call. Be there in a chopper in - I don’t know how long. Soon. Stay put, Steven. Do not run off before I can get there.”  
  
“Will do, Danno.”  
  
And the call ended.  
  
“That guy needs a chill pill,” Nicole said. Her phone rang again. “I don’t know that number.” But she answered it.  
  
It was Danny. “When you said ‘will do’, did you mean you were going to run off, or that you were going to stay put? Because -”  
  
“I’m staying put, I promise.”  
  
“Good. Love you, babe.” And then line went dead.  
  
Nicole stared at her phone. Sandra stared at Steve.  
  
He scrubbed a hand over his face. “He doesn’t mean it like - like that.”  
  
“But you wish he did?” Sandra asked.  
  
Steve laughed, but the sound was a little jagged. “Yeah.” He glanced at his watch. “Well, it’ll be a few hours till they get here. So?”  
  
“So I’ll do the dishes while Nicole puts on Age of Ultron and then Civil War,” Sandra said. “So you can find out what happens to Steve and Bucky.”  
  
Nicole glanced at Steve, who nodded.  
  
Roo and Flashbang curled up on the loveseat with Steve, one big puppy pile - Roo curled up on his chest, Flashbang sprawled across his legs - and Sandra and Nicole took the couch, and it was movie time, and the countdown to Steve’s farewell.  
  
Tony had just arrived at the Winter Soldier factory in Siberia when Roo and Flashbang abandoned Steve, headed for the door, barking and going berserk. Nicole scrambled after them just as the doorbell rang.  
  
“Sandra, can you get the door? I’ll hold the dogs.”  
  
Sandra followed, pulled open the door, and there they were, Danny Williams and the rest of the Five-0 Task Force, on the doorstep.  
  
“Where is he?” Danny demanded.  
  
Steve came up behind Sandra. “I’m here.”  
  
Danny grabbed Steve in a crushing hug. He was so much shorter than Steve, it was almost comical, but he also fit perfectly against Steve, tucked under his chin, faced pressed into his shirt.  
  
“Hey, babe, you all right?” Danny pulled back.  
  
“I’m all right.”  
  
“What are you wearing? Even for you, this is -”  
  
“He was naked when we found him,” Nicole said. “I had to loan him some stuff, but we’re all short in this house.”  
  
“Naked?” Concern furrowed Danny’s brow. “Babe -”  
  
“I’m fine,” Steve said. “Really. Memory’s a bit scrambled, maybe from drugs, maybe a knock on the head. I’ll get checked out by a doctor.”  
  
Danny narrowed his eyes at Nicole. “You didn’t take him to a doctor?”  
  
“He said he didn’t need one right away.”  
  
“And you trusted his judgment? He’s ridiculously heroic, he -”  
  
“He’s a regular Captain America, I’m sure,” Sandra said. “You should probably take him to a doctor now.”  
  
“Thanks, mom,” Steve said dryly. And then, more sincerely, to her and Nicole, “Thank you, really.”  
  
“You’re more than welcome,” Nicole said. “Roo and Flashbang will miss you.”  
  
Steve knelt to pet them and say goodbye.  
  
“Good luck with your Captain, Bucky,” Sandra said softly, and Steve smiled at her.  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“And - take a risk.”  
  
He nodded and straightened up, offered his hand. His handshake was brief but firm, confident, and Sandra could see how he’d been a soldier once.  
  
“Be careful,” the woman said. “You’re barefoot, and it’s muddy out here.”  
  
“A little mud never hurt me.” Steve stepped out of the house and pulled the door closed behind him. Sandra and Nicole went to peer out the kitchen window at the cavalcade of black government SUVs.  
  
“So no chopper after all,” Sandra said.  
  
“Probably nowhere to land it,” Nicole said. “So, that was weird. How about some rom-coms?”  
  
“You don’t think that was romantic?”  
  
“It wasn’t very comedic.”  
  
“True.”  
  
“Think we’ll ever see them again?”  
  
“Maybe one day.”  
  
“Ladies’ Trip to Hawaii?”  
  
“You’re on.”


End file.
